Encounters Part One
The first time Danny met Scarlett, he was exploring the Realms. That was how it had started, at least. Now, it seemed more like he was lost in the Realms. Which wasn’t great. Or good. Especially when he was supposed to be home for dinner soon.
Scarlett was drifting through the Realms near her lair when she spotted him. Rumors of Phantom had been spreading in the Realms, and this boy looked a lot like Phantom. White hair, green eyes, jumpsuit. Scarlett wasn’t sure what possessed her, but she started floating towards him.
“You look lost,” a voice sounded next to Danny, and he turned to see who the speaker was.
The ghost wasn’t one he’d seen before. She had bright red hair and purple eyes, and she was wearing some sort of black and red jumpsuit. She was grinning at him, though.
“I am lost,” Danny admitted, sheepish.
“I figured. My name is Scarlett. Where are you trying to go?” she asked.
“Oh, um, I’m Phantom. And I was trying to get to the standing portal I came from.”
Scarlett nodded. “Nice to meet you, Phantom. What’s around the portal you came from? Maybe I can help you find it.”
“Um, Walker’s prison is the closest thing, but mostly it’s just empty space,” Danny offered.
“Ah, the Barrens, then. I know the way. I can show you, if you want.”
“Um, yeah, that would be good. Thank you.”
Scarlett nodded. “Fly with me, Phantom.”
They started moving.
“So, there’s been a lot of noise about you in the Realms recently,” Scarlett said, after a while of silence.
“Oh?” Danny asked, hoping he sounded neutral.
“Yup. They say you’re a good fighter, and you have ghost hunters shooting at you. There’s even a rumor that you’re half human, and maybe you know the ghost hunters somehow.”
“Is there now?” Danny asked, stiffly.
Scarlett regarded him out of the corner of her eye.
“Yeah, there is. Anyway, I remember what being a new ghost was like. I’m not looking to give you a hard time or anything. Just curious,” she said, casually.
“I see,” Danny said, still off put.
They flew the rest of the way in silence.
Scarlett grew more curious after that. Her own secret of being half ghost was just that, a secret. She had also been around longer than Phantom, though. He was just a kid. She wasn’t sure that justified the spying on him that she was currently doing, but hey, no one ever said she was justified. He was a half ghost kid that was clearly in over his head. Learning that he was half ghost wasn’t surprising. Learning that they shared a biological mother? That was a little more shocking.
The second time Danny met Scarlett, she came out of the portal. He was walking home from school with Tucker and Sam. He looked around, then changed and flew up to meet her, ecto blasts ready. She raised her hands in surrender.
“I’m not here to fight you. I just want to talk,” she announced, drifting down closer to the ground.
“So talk,” Danny demanded, not letting go of his ecto blasts.
“I wondered if you’d let me train you,” she said, calmly.
Danny’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Why?” he demanded.
Scarlett smiled. “In the Realms, children are very rare, and very precious. You shouldn’t have to fight and struggle against every ghost you meet. You should have ghosts on your team, too. Plus, we’re more alike than you think.”
“I….” Danny trailed off, anger derailed. His ecto blasts fizzled out.
“I’ll think about it,” he promised, finally.
Scarlett nodded. “That’s all I ask. I’ll hang around your portal for a few weeks. Just let me know.”
“Okay, sure,” Danny agreed.
Scarlett gave a little wave and flew off. Danny landed next to Sam and Tucker and changed back.
“That was weird, dude,” Tucker commented.
“I know, right? That’s the ghost I was telling you guys about that showed me how to get back to the portal the other day,” Danny agreed.
“What do you think you’ll do?” Sam asked.
Danny shrugged. “Honestly, I don’t know yet.”
His first instinct in such matters was, of course, to ask Jazz. He had barely gotten into the house before he was knocking on her door.
“Come in!” Jazz called.
Danny barged in, slammed the door behind him, and dramatically flopped face down on her bed. He groaned. Jazz raised an eyebrow.
“What’s up?” she asked.
“You know that ghost I told you about? That helped me in the Realms? Scarlett?” he asked.
“I do,” Jazz agreed.
“She showed up on the walk home today and asked to train me. Something about children being precious in the Realms and that I should have ghosts on my team too,” Danny grumbled.
“Do you believe her?” Jazz asked.
“Yes? No? I don’t know?”
“It would help you to have an adult looking out for you. Even if the adult is a ghost. You know I’ll always be here for you, but there are things I can’t do.”
“I know,” Danny agreed, sighing.
“But you don’t know if you can trust her,” Jazz sympathized.
“Yup.”
“She didn’t attack you or anything, did she?”
“No.”
“You could always try it. Start off slow. See if you feel like you can trust her. If you’re comfortable with that, that is,” Jazz offered.
“The thing is, I want her to teach me. There are so many things about my ghost half that I don’t understand, and she seemed sincere. But then I’m worried, what if I’m missing something and I get hurt?” Danny lamented, his face still buried in Jazz’s mattress.
“I could come with you, you know. You and I have taken out plenty of ghosts together. It might be better if I had your back, anyway. At least until you know her better.”
Danny sat up and turned to Jazz, smiling a little.
“That, that could work,” he agreed.
The third time Danny met Scarlett, it was a week later in the Barrens.
“You’re here,” Scarlett exclaimed, happily.
“I am,” Danny agreed.
“So? What did you decide?” Scarlett asked.
Danny smiled. “I’d like you to teach me, but only if you’ll let my sister Jazz come too.”
“Not a problem!” Scarlett exclaimed.
Then she laughed and clapped and threw her arms around him. Danny found he didn’t mind so much.
They started out their training in a field outside the city limits of Amity Park. Danny had chosen the location, and Scarlett had seemed happy enough to agree. Jazz was sitting in a lawn chair with a book, her batons strapped over her back. She wasn’t reading yet, though. They were waiting for Scarlett to show up still.
A green portal opened and Scarlett drifted out. The portal closed behind her. Danny waved, somewhat shyly.
“Hey, Scarlett,” he greeted.
Scarlett smiled at him. “Hello, Phantom.”
Jazz stood then and walked over to Scarlett. Scarlett was drifting above the ground a little, and she was taller than Jazz already. This made Jazz’s attempt at an intimidating glare slightly less effective.
“I’m Jazz, I’m Phantom’s older sister. If you hurt him, I will hurt you,” she threatened.
“Jazz, c’mon,” Danny said from behind her, putting a hand on her shoulder.
“It’s nice to meet you, Jazz. If I ever hurt Phantom, I’ll deserve whatever you do to me. Fair enough?” Scarlett asked, with a sad smile.
Jazz was not derailed. “Agreed,” she growled, before stalking back to her lawn chair.
Scarlett turned to Danny, clapping her hands and rubbing them together.
“Shall we get started, then?”
The consensus, after a month and a half of this, was that Scarlett could be trusted. Danny trusted her after the first week, but Jazz was a lot more cautious than he was. When his older sister finally relented that, yes, she trusted Scarlett, Danny felt it was long overdue.
One the bright side, his lessons then moved from the field outside Amity to various locations within the Realms. Scarlett explained the concept of Lairs, and after a while, they began searching for Danny’s. They found it. He named it Red Willow, after the very ghostly red willow tree that stood at its center.
It was a few months later that Scarlett introduced Danny to another ghost. She called him her uncle, and his name was Clockwork. He was very old, and powerful, and...kind. He was kind. It was a strange thing for Danny, to meet a ghost other than Scarlett that was kind to him. It was even stranger when, a few days later, Clockwork asked Danny to be his apprentice. Danny said yes.